


In silent screams, In wildest dreams

by ToriCeratops



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II
Genre: Amnesia, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Canon-Typical themes, Happy Ending, M/M, Memory Loss, Post-Dragon Age: Inquisition
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-26
Updated: 2018-05-05
Packaged: 2019-04-28 01:15:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14438316
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ToriCeratops/pseuds/ToriCeratops
Summary: Hawke has been gone for almost two years.  Lost for a little less, but the timing doesn't matter.  Nothing matters anymore.Fenris runs on instinct, fighting, continuing their work though with much less of the heart that Garrett always had.Then, one unexpected day, he hears an impossibly familiar voice, sees a face that shouldn't be, and gets captured by a man he had thought he'd never see again.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Y'all I'm like _really_ late to this party but I thought I'd bring some munchies anyway.

_ Your kiss, my cheek, I watched you leave  
Your smile, my ghost, I fell to my knees _

_ ~*~ _

 

 

_ Hawke is gone, _

The words grip at his heart, a vice like nothing he has ever felt.

 

**

“There’s been a change of plans.”  Fenris slammed their bedroom door, storming over to the desk in a cloud of ire.  His vision was so blurred from anger he had missed that he’d caught Hawke in nothing but his small clothes in the middle of packing their bags.  At the desk, he tossed page after page aside until he found the letter he was looking for, the one that had painted only half the picture, then shoved both that one and the new one still in his trembling hands towards his half-naked lover.  “We’re going to Wycome.”

Then, he did notice.  The look of surprise on Hawke’s face combined with the always welcome and extremely pleasant sight of his almost bare body let a few notches of tension loose from Fenris’ spine.  He took a deep breath.

“Wycome?”  Hawke’s tone was only mildly amused.  When he stepped in to read the newest piece of the puzzle he didn’t take the offered missives but rather brought himself into Fenris’ space, a soothing hand at this back as they held the pages together.  “That’s-” His amusement vanished with a long, drawn-out sigh.

Isabella’s letters had been useful to a fault, giving them clues here and there as to the best place to start looking for the source of the slavers they had been dealing with for the last year.  But the one in his hands showed a bleak picture building on the Amaranthine coast. They had planned to leave for Nevarra, to follow a lead there, but if Isabella’s estimations were correct…

“Garrett.  We can’t just expect this many people to be alright just because we kill the men who took them.”  There may be dozens being smuggled beneath the port town, and who knows how far away from their homes or how long ago they had been taken.  

Hawke moved from Fenris’ side to his front, holding him close and pressed a tender kiss to tightly furrowed brows.  His touch eased Fenris somewhat, always sharing in his burden, never putting anything aside as unimportant or chastising him for his seemingly endless anger.  He allowed him to feel - to feel everything - and held him through it.

“We have resources and a reliable network that can help them.  That can help us, help them. We will do everything we can to either get them home or get them started on a new life.  I promise.”

 

**

 

_ Hawke is gone, _

In his hands the page shakes so much he drops it even as he falls to his knees.  From the ground the scratch of ink mocks him, not bowing to his silent pleas to change, to be different, be WRONG.  

It can’t be true.  

It isn’t. 

It isn’t right.  

It isn’t fair.  

His sobs come quickly, painful spasms in his chest as the ache desperately finds a way to escape.  Each jolt stirs up the anger, the rage a quickly boiling ichor where his heart used to be. 

 

**

Aches and fatigue from battle had nothing on the exhaustion written on every feature of the Elves crawling slowly out of the hidden hold beneath the now otherwise empty compound.  It wasn’t just the hunch of their shoulders or the slowness of their pace, but the hollow, emptiness of their gaze. These people had long ago abandoned hope.

From somewhere in the darkness beyond the tiny hatch, a giggle floated through the air, the soft sound of a babe he hadn’t expected. His breath caught in his chest as he waited, letting it go in a huff of surprise and wonder at seeing Hawke carrying a tiny little scrap of a thing at his side.  The child’s merriment at whatever he had been whispering to it changed abruptly in the sunlight, replaced with a whine as it hid its face in Hawke’s red scarf. 

“There now, love.  The sunshine is not so bad.  We just have to get used to it again.”  He spoke quietly, raising a hand to shade its sensitive and large eyes from the offending light.  The child looked human, no older than a year, and given the entire group was Elven, Fenris had no delusions as to the most likely reason for its birth among slaves.

For hours they worked with the captives, mending what they could and providing food and clean water from the now dead slavers.  It was not a long journey to the first safe house, but any journey would be arduous in the state they were in. Through it all, Hawke never let the babe - a girl, Fenris learned eventually - from his side, removing the hard metal of his armor so he could wrap the child up against his chest.  In quiet moments he would speak to her, play a game by hiding his eyes behind his hand and eliciting squeals of delight from her when he removed it. When she cried, he comforted her with songs Fenris had never heard before, but that were sang with the familiarity of a lifetime of memories.

He didn’t have to wonder if those were the songs his mother had sang - if he had sung them to Carver and Bethany in their youth.  He could see it in the longing in Hawke’s eyes, in the way they glistened with unshed tears as he kissed the child’s mess of dark hair.  

Once they were all safe at their first refuge, far on the outskirts of town, and the girl’s mother well enough to care for her once more, it still took Fenris four more days to ask what had been plaguing him from the moment he saw the child in his arms.

“Do you regret that you won’t have children?”

Hawke made a joke because that is what Hawke always did.  But Fenris kept pushing. He needed to know, needed to have the truth out and on display no matter how painful it was to him.  When the yelling started something told him to stop, to quit picking at the wound but he couldn’t help himself. He couldn’t help himself because Hawke refused to deny it, refused to say one way or the other even though Fenris knew he couldn’t have wanted anything less, not with the way he still talks of a family in general, of how happy and complete his had been.

Perhaps, the past tense of that thought should have been his clue.

With his fist against the wall and his eyes shut tight as if he could hide himself away from the pain, Hawke’s angry shouts quickly dissolved into quiet pleas for mercy.  “Whatever life I thought I would have when I was younger died the day Carver died, the day we escaped Ferelden. And then again when Bethany didn't-” He barely suppressed a sob, the sound of it ripping at Fenris’ insides and tearing him down to little bits in every manner he deserved.  “And mother…”

He went to Hawke then, ashamed and furious at himself.  He should have known. If he had stopped to think, for but a moment - “I am a fool.”

“Fool or not,”  Hawke reached for him, even then, entwining his fingers behind Fenris’ neck and meeting his gaze, eyes full of pain.  “You ARE my life, Fenris. I want nothing more than you. I don’t even think I’d have the courage to care for anything else.  Not now. Not after everything.”

They kissed, long and slow, familiar in its touch and all the sweeter for it.    

“I love you.”  Hawke reminded him, begging him to believe it. “And you are all I need, I swear it.”

Fenris nodded, he knew, he knew from the start.  From the first touch so many years before, when he’d welcomed him back so damned easily after the first of many times Fenris had been a fool.  Every word, every action, every  _ day  _ he was reminded just how much this man loved him.  

“I’m sorry.”

 

**

 

_ Hawke is gone, Fenris.  I’m so sorry. _

There is more to the letter, more came before and there is still more to go.  But Fenris has forgotten the first in the mind-numbing haze of his pain and the rest - 

Well, the rest doesn’t matter anymore, does it?

 

 

**

Fenris always woke first.  He found it annoying, for about the first month of their relationship.  Then, rather quickly, he had come to find the small joy of watching Hawke sleep in peace.  Years together, and that never really faded. His face was soft, lips parted as his quiet snores filled the room.  No matter how many times he had tried to convince the man of his sleeping sounds, Hawke never believed him. What he did believe, and Fenris was convinced he did on purpose, was the way he wined and clung to him like he did then when Fenris tried to rise with his lover still caught between sleep and wakefulness.

Free of Hawke’s grasp, he stretched, stifling a contented groan at how his entire body was blissfully sore from his elbows to his knees.  Most of the time their lovemaking was rough and passionate but relatively short. By the next morning, it would be nothing but a pleasant memory and maybe a bruise or two.  But when Hawke was in the mood to draw things out, Fenris would feel it for days after, every pull of a tender muscle eliciting an affectionate smile. 

In their desk, hidden away was something he had been intending to give to Hawke for a few days.  Right then, in the quiet morning while streaks of light from their dirty windows highlighted the long, hard won lines and muscles of his lovers bare flesh, seemed like the perfect moment.

He grabbed his small parcel that fit in the palm of his hand, and returned to the bed, sitting at Hawke’s side and leaning in to kiss him fully awake.  It didn’t take long, though he did have to stop the other man’s wandering hands a few times.

Hawke’s pout lasted but a moment.  Then he sighed and looked up at Fenris with heavily lidded eyes, full of sleep and contentment.  “Good morning, beautiful. Have I told you how beautiful you are?”

“Not today.”  He admitted, not bothering to point out that the day had only just begun, especially as he was likely to say it several times more.  He always did.

“How unfortunate!  What a travesty! I must endeavour to correct this grave error, to recite all the things the mere sight of you does to my heart.”  His hands started to move lower down Fenris’ torso again, and his voice dipped low. “Not to mention my -”

Fenris placed a single finger against Hawke’s lips, though it didn’t stop his touch.  

“You are being ridiculous.”  He chided through a wide, contradictory grin he couldn’t have hid if he wanted to.

“Just being honest.”  Hawke argued before taking his tongue to Fenris’ finger and slipping it between his lips in an obscene reminder of just what that mouth was capable of.

“An honest sap.”  Before the sight could affect him too much, clouding his thoughts with even more desire, Fenris pulled his hand back.  This earned him his second pout of the morning.  “I got you something.”

“Oh?”  Hawke sat up then, leaning on one elbow with an excited light in his eyes.  “You aren’t usually one for gift giving?” He said, though it wasn’t accusatory.  He was right. Fenris hated giving gifts unless they were perfect and nothing was ever good enough for Hawke.  At least in Fenris’ mind.

Before he could back out of it altogether, Fenris tipped the small fabric pouch over into Hawke’s hand.  The silver, sovereign sized pendant fell into it face down. From the back, it looked like a simple metal circle.  A little worn, perhaps, but otherwise solid. When Hawke turned it over, however, he gasped in shock and ran his thumb tenderly over the somewhat weathered relief of the head of a wolf.  

It is rare to find anything outside of ancient Elven ruins depicting the animal.  But he had found it in the market one day, hiding in a secret compartment in an old trinket box that he paid too much for just to get the thing.  

“I thought I was the sentimental one in this relationship?”  Hawke asked, trying to joke through his reverence of the object in his hand, disbelief and joy mixed together in his expression.  

“And you are right.  Which is why I am giving it to you.”  Fenris assured him. Before he could say anything further on the matter, on how he had thought Hawke might want to carry it with him or some such nonsense, he found himself caught up in a deep and loving kiss.

A frantic knock at their front door broke the embrace, Fenris scowling while Hawke laughed.  “You get that. I’m not decent.”

Neither was Fenris, but he didn’t argue, instead opting to make a show of stretching from the bed and grabbing the nearest pair of trousers, whoever they belonged to.

Upon his return he found Hawke still lounging in their bed, basking in the early morning sunlight.

“It’s a letter from Varric.”  He was the only one who knew how to track them down, where to find them.  Fenris may have had Hawke’s affection, but he’ll always have to share a piece of him with the dwarf.

“Come on then.”  Hawke, still naked save the leather strap now around his neck with the wolf pendant hanging in the center of his chest, patted the bed next to him.  “We will read it together.”

By that night, Hawke was leaving.  There was no question that he would go, or that he would go alone.  Their work was too important and too close to completion to be left undone.  But Corypheus was too much of a threat not to get involved. Hawke would go to Varric, help finish what they thought they had finished years before, and Fenris would follow, the moment he was able.

In each other’s arms, not willing to let go first, they kissed for what both wished could have been all of eternity.  “Stay safe.” Hawke nearly commanded, his voice almost broken across the words.

“Come back to me.”  Fenris found himself pleading, the edge of his usually stern voice lost in the tidal wave of his fear.

“As long as there is still breath in my lungs, I will always return to your side.”

Hawke promised.

And Fenris believed him.

But Fenris had a habit of being a fool. 

**

 

_ Hawke is gone,  _

And all of Fenris’ life and future with him. 

 


	2. Caught

After two months, Fenris stopped communicating with anyone he had ever known because of Hawke and all but disappeared.  Letters still found him, for a while. Varric tried so hard to get through to him but he hadn’t cared. At first, he drank his way from town to town, several weeks passing in a blur of piss-poor alcohol, fights, and dirt floors.  He was thrown in more than a few cells- more times than he remembers anyway - always slipping out before he actually sobered up. The amount of property damage he caused through that time was likely astronomical. His pain fueled his rage and his rage flew unbidden from the drink.

It wasn’t a pleasant time, but it was far superior to the numbness of Hawke’s loss.

One time, after Varric’s final letter that found him, he tried to stop, to sober up.  He had crawled to the roof of the chantry of whatever town he had been in at the time and did a lot of cursing at the Maker under a blanket of stars.  Seemed like the best place for that particular conversation. But the hollowness he had found in the silence burned like no pain he had ever felt before.  His stomach heaved and his heart felt as if an ogre made of steel kept it beneath its foot.

He cursed at the sky, his words lost among the void of night.

It was the last time he cried, and the last time he was sober.

What he did do, however, was learn to moderate.  A constant buzz in his head fueling the barrier between his heart and the misery of his reality was better than losing weeks at a time.  He no longer woke in cells, avoided almost all the fights people tried to start with him and managed to finally exist in the shadows again, lost to everyone as long as he didn’t want to be found.

The night he heard of Corypheus’ defeat, he lost two more days and woke up in the filthy holdings of a slaver’s den.

Twelve slavers died by his hand that morning though he was grateful they’d had no other prisoners at the time.

Killing he could do.

Compassion was beyond him.

He continues on that bloody path, picking up not exactly where he had left off, but maybe a few steps to the side.  Instead of waiting for their captives to arrive and ensuring their safety, he strikes when their cells are empty and raids their goods, learns their secrets, and moves on to the next.

It has been six months since that morning, well over a year since Varric’s damning letter, and even longer since he last held Hawke in his arms.  

Now, he waits in the shadows on a cool spring evening hidden by the tall smooth stone of the Nevarran city of Perendale.  He waits for the night to grow darker, for the people to retire, and the guards to grow complacent. Across the way is an almost hidden entrance to a long forgotten tomb, covered in ivy and passed by dozens every day.  No one knows what lays behind the forgotten door. Those inside think the rest of the world has simply lost it from memory.

Time ticks by slowly as he waits, minding how long it's been by the arc of the moon.  It is a mere sliver in the sky, keeping the evening shadowed in a cold darkness. When the last voices of nearby guards fade with their retreating footsteps Fenris finally moves.  He steps lightly across the street, making no noise and keeping an eye down the path the guards had taken. At the door, he brushes thick, tangled vines aside so he can press his ear to the stone.  

The moment he is sure there’s no noise on either side, he takes a deep breath, focuses his energy, and steps through.

When he lets go of his breath on the other side he already has his sword in hand, prepared for the worst.  Though he has no care if anyone on the outside had seen his little light display, he needs to have caution within.

As still as he can be and holding his breath once more, Fenris listens.

Once his eyes adjust he finds himself standing as expected, at the top of a steep flight of stairs leading into the depths of the city, walls lined with bones.  A steady drip is the only sound, echoing through the damp air in a slow, constant tempo.

One, careful, patient step at a time, Fenris descends into the darkness.

Old magic lingers there, clinging to the walls and the bones that lay in each alcove.  He can feel it, crawling on his skin like a million spiders, calling to the lyrium etched there. Its all he can do not to make a sound of disgust.

Far below the city, a light finally begins illuminating his path.  Shortly after he sees it, voices join in his senses.

“I can’t believe he’s given the bastard so much.”  Is the first thing he hears clearly, the man not bothering to keep his gruff voice down.

“I know!”  A higher pitched, nasally voice joins in.  “Just because he can swing that big fuck off sword thinks he can barge in here and run the place.”

There’s a grunt, followed by mumbling then raucous laughter.

Fenris reaches the bottom of the steps and stops, checking down the two corridors that branch off from there - empty and dark.  Ahead he can make out the silhouette of the two figures he can hear. It is clear they have their backs to him which puts him on high alert for traps.  It’s never been a good idea to assume people are just idiots - even if it does turn out to be the case more often than not.

Careful not to let his sword lax or touch any stone - lest he alerts them on his own - Fenris crouches low.  He scans the flagstones head. He is no Varric, who could spot a trap across the room, but he had learned over the years a few tricks of his own.  He scans, left to right, one stone at a time. They are all raised and worn, but each has a similar shine to them.

Left.  Right.

Left.  Right.

Left - there.  Not as smooth as the others, almost imperceptibly higher.

At this point, he has two options.  

He can avoid the pressure plate, sneak up behind them and remove their heads before they even know something is wrong. But that leaves a lot of unknowns.  There could be others in the room, silent. He also has a rough idea of the layout up ahead, but no idea how many other men would be in what direction.

But if he sets the trap off…

It could be an explosion or just some sort of alarm.  Either way, they would hear, come and investigate, and run straight to him.

And his blade.

The advantage is in the bottleneck.  He can and would take on a large group, but anything to better his odds is the way to go.  

Stepping back and into one of the first corridors he had crossed, he searches for a heavy, throwable object.  There he finds the wall lined with even more bones and has to carefully extract one that will work.

In the dark, his fingers find a skull that feels solid enough for his purposes.

He takes a deep breath and moves with care.  The silence all around him is almost overbearing.

But his prize comes free without breaking it.

Now, he is ready.

To avoid any possibilities of certain death, he is careful to keep most of his body hidden around the corner when he lets it fly.

Sure enough, a wall of flame erupts, filling the main corridor with a deafening roar.  The fire that makes it around his corner licks at his skin but disappears a moment later.  The emptiness left by the flame is filled with heavy footsteps coming straight for him.

In one, fluid movement he steps from the shadows and takes down one attacker.  The second manages three or four parries, then Fenris has him down too.

He steps slowly, listening to the chaos up ahead.  There are at least a dozen, possibly more.

Another comes down the hall, shouting a battle cry that just makes him roll his eyes and cut that one down too.

Another, and another.  Five bodies lay in his wake.

Five recently fallen bodies, anyway.

There are far, far more behind him.

A fact which he is reminded of when a sickening green glow rushes to fill the darkness, spreading out along the walls like spider webs, veins of a sparkling emerald.

“Fasta vass.”

They have a mage.

Almost as one, dozens of skeletons begin to slide from their resting places, the click-clack of their bones a sickening sound that makes his spine convulse involuntarily.

Worse, they have a necromancer.

Fuck magic.

And fuck Nevarra.

Fenris bolts toward his only option.  A dozen live bodies is suddenly a better choice than a hundred moving dead ones.  He is surprised to find the next room empty, not so surprised to find more skeletons shambling slowly through the rest of the doorways.

All except one.

With all his rage and a battle cry of his own, Fenris charges into exactly what he had been trying to avoid.  At least if today is his last day, he can take a lot of slavers with him.

The door bursts with his weight thrown behind it, knocking down one attacker the moment he is in the room.

Then everything moves in a blur.

He whirls, trying to put more energy in knocking back the crowd than taking any more out yet.  The less he has to face at a time the better. Steel clashes, over and over. With his strength, he pushes the attack.  With his limberness, he dodges theirs. When he can’t parry or phase out of the way, he ducks, getting a few well-timed jumps in so that some of their attacks land on their cohorts.  Honestly, he doesn’t do too bad at first.

But then, a laugh cuts through.

A sound above all the rest from a figure he doesn’t have the ability to focus on standing on a high dais.  It is a sound that nearly slaps him senseless, and he almost takes a sword to the knee.

“One?  Just one against you lot?”

Pain rips through his arm when a blade slices though.  He is distracted by an impossible voice, deep and smooth, amusement in every tone and word that tears at Fenris’ heart with barbed familiarity.

It is beautiful and wretched all at once.

He has to get out from here.  He has to get to the dais, take down whoever dares to pretend.  His shout is fierce with rage, the arc of his blade harder and more powerful than ever.

The moment his path is clear he rushes the steps, sword held in front of him.  At the top, he freezes with the tip of his blade pressed dangerously against the man's throat.  

Piercing blue eyes meet his, eyes that he knows, that couldn’t possibly belong to anyone else.  His hair is longer, beard unkempt, but those eyes - they hold no fear, but an endless amount of amusement.

Suddenly, Fenris can’t move, can’t breathe, can’t think!

A storm of confusion fills his mind, of hurt and betrayal, disbelief and agony.

Hawke.

“My, you are beautiful, aren’t you?” He says with an excruciatingly familiar smirk.  

Fenris can’t even process his words before pain blossoms at the back of his head and his world goes dark.

 

**

 

Dreams plague Fenris.

Old terrors.  New pains.

Usually, the drink is enough to keep them at bay.  But images of Hawke haunt him like never before. His voice, his laugh.  Once a welcomed comfort, now mocks him. It torments him. Reminds him of his faults, his failures, of how many times he had deserved so much worse than the life he’d gotten, despite how short lived his happiness had been.

He jerks awake from the sound of a door slamming nearby, disoriented for only a moment.  

The first thing he does is take stock.

His body aches, not just from battle but from where he has been on his knees for who knows how long with his hands bound to his ankles.  They have taken his armor, though not his clothes, which is something at least. The room he is in is bare, walls smooth. He is the only thing in it, not even any bones like every other room in the accursed place keep him company.  If he is even still in the crypt, that is.

Since they hadn’t killed him, it is likely they intend to sell him.  But that means he will have plenty of opportunities to escape, he just has to be patient.  

“He awake?”

Oh yes.

There is that problem too.

Fenris can’t see either man on the other side of the door even though there is a window with rusted bars.  The one he assumes is his guard answers. “Yeah. But don’t go gettin’ any ideas, Mac. Boss’ll be able to fetch a good price for this one and he don’t like no one touchin’ his goods.”

“Who, me?”  Hawke - or whoever, whatever it really is - says with mock offense.  

“I saw the way you was lookin’ at him.”

The lock clicking open echoes in the empty room.

“A man can look, can’t he?”

He comes bearing a torch that he sets in the wall as he steps inside, the light dancing with eerie reflections across the smooth, slightly damp surface of the room.  The guard, a short, stocky man, doesn’t leave, opting instead to lean in the open doorway and watch, cautious.

The pretender makes several circles around Fenris’ kneeling form, making small, thoughtful noises.  Fenris doesn’t move, barely breathes. He stares straight down at the ground and refuses to look up.  “You didn’t bandage his arm.”

With a grunt, the guard shrugs.

“You complain about me ‘touching the goods’ like I’ll ruin him somehow but you’ll sit there and let his arm get infected and rot off?”  Haw- the _slaver_ kneels at his injured side.  It is all he can do not to flinch away.  He does, however, level his best sneer at the ground.  “Go get me a healing kit.” Under his breath, he grumbles.  “Not a spare brain in the lot of them. It’s no wonder you were about to take them all down.”  

Fenris braces himself for the pain of a careless touch, both on his injury and his markings.

But when the man rips at his sleeve it's a slow movement, as if he is being careful not to jerk.  When his hands are pressed against skin he feels a warm and painfully familiar tenderness.

His stomach boils at the thought.  He retches, just barely holding back the bile.  

“Mac!”  

In his misery, Fenris missed the return of his guard, who tosses something in the room.  After a moment of digging the man at his side uncorks a bottle.

“I’m sorry.”  He says so quietly he almost misses it.  And then louder, “This is going to hurt.”

At first, the liquid is simply ice against his skin.  But then it finds his wound, seeps into the ragged edges of his flesh, and burns like the sun.

He nearly cries out from the pain, gritting his teeth so tightly he thinks he may break his jaw while all the muscles in his body act on reflex to try and get away.  Though he doesn’t consciously remember blacking out again, it seems as if from one blink to the next everything changes. The pain has dulled to a low throb though his head is starting to hurt a lot more.  Whether that is from the earlier blow or his inevitable hangover he’s not sure. Instead of at his side, the man who patched his arm up, who he had been a heartbeat from killing a few hours earlier, is now sitting back against the closed door - watching.

They are alone.

This time, Fenris stares back, willing something to make sense.  Wondering if this is some kind of cruel joke from the Maker. He remembers the mage, and can’t help but wonder if perhaps this is some sort of demon.

As soon as the thought strikes him, he lets it go.

If it is a demon, it has done a terrible job.

Oh, it looks like him and sounds like him - and damn the Maker it feels like him.  But no one would ever - could ever - believe that Hawke would willingly work here in this den of corruption.

“Who are you?” The stranger with his dead lover’s face asks.

Despite his conviction that this is not Hawke, those simple words sting more than he had thought possible.

“Did someone send you here? Or maybe…”  he pauses, tapping his lips in thought.

Just like he used to.

Before he died.

“I know!  Former slave!  Probably came through here at some point.  Escaped. Out for vengeance now, hm? Still, don’t know how you got in.  The city entrance is still sealed up tight.”

Fenris doesn’t say anything.  His glare grows darker and he remains deathly still, waiting for the man to give something away.  

Anything.

Anything to put Fenris out of the misery of not knowing what the hell is going on.

“I can sit here and wait for an answer all night, you know.  Got nowhere else to be.”

When Fenris still doesn't respond, doesn’t move, the man sighs.  Then he shifts until he is slouched a little further against the door as if he’s settling in.  

“Well if you won’t talk, I might as well.  You know any good jokes?” He stops, looking expectant, then waves him off.  “No, of course, you don’t. Two Mages and a Pirate walk into a tavern - stop me if you’ve heard this one - carrying two nugs and a barrel.”

Suddenly, Fenris can’t breathe.  

 

 

> _“They smuggled the nug in a rug!”_
> 
> _Fenris let his arms go lax, dropping himself onto a laughing Hawke.  Their bare bodies were flush, pressed together and warm from their activities.  He groaned. “I’ll be sure to tell Varric,” he grumbled into the crook of Hawke’s neck. “That he is in no danger of you ever supplanting him as the local favored story teller.”_
> 
> _Hawke’s hands were everywhere, a mixture of soft touches and firmer grasps expertly designed to heighten Fenris’ desire.  He could play his body like an instrument and Fenris loved every second of it. “Don’t bring up Varric right now.” Hawke complained with a whine.  “You’ll kill the mood.”_
> 
> _Fenris pushed himself back up on his hands, arms bracketing Hawke’s head and stared at him in disbelief.  “Nug smuggling, Garrett.” He tried and succeeded - at first - to keep his features otherwise blank, biting back on  his own amusement._
> 
> _But Hawke’s smile, his bright laughter, was always infections.  “So I killed it then? Hm.” With a quick movement and eliciting a shout and laugh of surprise from Fenris, he flipped their positions, immediately peppering his lover’s skin with promising kisses that punctuated his words.  “Guess I'll need to work extra hard to revive it then.”_

 

He can’t hold back on the anguish he knows must be written all over his face.  Since he can’t hope to control it, Fenris drops his gaze, chin pressed against his chest and eyes shut tight against the truth.

This is Hawke.

Tears well within his closed eyes which he refuses to let fall, to let this all-new kind of agony show in any way.  

It’s like nothing he’s ever felt before.

His shoulders jerk once before he tightens his muscles to stop giving anything away.

“Come on.  It wasn’t that bad.”

Hawke.

It is Hawke.  

It is _Garrett._

He keeps talking but Fenris doesn't listen, his own thoughts a roar in his ears.  He isn’t dead. Was he ever? Did anything happen as he was told? It had to. He had seen Varric once, weeks after, seen the loss in his eyes almost as keenly as he had felt his own.  But here he is.

Real.

Solid.

Fenris doesn’t know what is worse: that he doesn’t seem to recognize him in the least….

Or that the man he loves is holding him captive, ready to sell him to the highest bidder.


	3. Ghosts

 

Time is impossible to track.  There is no cycle of darkness and light, and no real sense that anyone comes to him at set intervals.  He is trapped, in this silence, in the barren room, with nothing but his own thoughts and memories.

Every single one of them haunts him.

Fenris estimates it has been a few days.  Guards bring him food and water, only enough to keep him alive.  

Hawke sneaks him more.

But his presence only makes it worse.

When the others aren’t watching his every move Hawke even manages to check on Fenris’ arm, touch just as careful when replacing the bandages as he had been dressing it in the first place.  He is also the only one who loosens his chains, lets him move a few times a day so that he doesn’t have to wallow in his own filth. The act confuses him, though it is not the only one.

Nothing is exactly clear in this moment of his life.

Hawke talks at him, but not every time he comes.  He imagines the man grows tired of talking to himself, as Fenris never once offers up a single word.  Most of the time he doesn’t even look up for fear the sight will break him completely. So they sit in heavy silence.  He can feel Hawke’s gaze, catches him in his peripheral vision staring as if he is trying to solve a puzzle of some kind.

“I’m trying to place your markings.” After ages of silence, Hawke breaks it.  At first Fenris fears he will come and touch them, but he doesn’t move. “They’re not like any Dalish I’ve seen before, and I don’t think I’ve seen another elf with any quite so striking.”

He entertains, briefly, the idea of drawing their power out, letting him see that they are not so simple as all that.  But he still has to escape at some point. Now is not that time. Giving even a hint of his power would make that more difficult.

“Although I can’t help but think I’ve seen them somewhere before.”  

Feris jerks his head up at those words, spoken quietly - like Hawke was just as confused as he is.  Just as lost.

He stares, gaze locked with his captor’s, trying to comprehend, searching for any further hint of recognition.

“How,” he repeats a question he has asked a dozen times, “Did you get in here?”  This time, though, he isn’t asking as someone who hasn’t a clue, but rather as if he knows that he has the answer right in front of him, he just can’t piece together what that is.  “There are only two ways in and out of this crypt. I was guarding one and the other still has the seals I put in place myself.”

The answer  _ is  _ right in front of him and Fenris sighs.

He can’t say anything.  He shouldn’t, anyway. He still isn’t sure what the hell is going on, why or how Hawke is here.  There is no warmth or recognition in his gaze so Fenris is convinced it isn’t an act. But he also is not being overly kind.  The false sense of friendliness he is - was - so good at convincing almost everyone he turned it on.

  
  


> “I ain’t tellin you shit.”
> 
> Fenris back handed their captive just as he had tried to spit.  The man had a deeply Ferelden accent despite the Orlesian finery he sported.  They’d had him for hours, snagged him trying to set up a buyer’s get together with one of their marks in Wycome.  It would have worked, too - too many parties in the town of drink of leisure. No one would have suspected anything out of the ordinary.
> 
> More likely, no one would have cared.
> 
> “Darling.”  Hawke laid a gentle hand at Fenris’ elbow, speaking in an exaggerated tone he recognized immediately.  He never called him that. It was meant to placate their prisoner, show kindness and that he had some control over the ‘savage elf’.  “Violence and pain are going to get you nowhere.”
> 
> As he had several times before, Fenris played along.  He grunted his frustration - which was genuine enough - and backed away, stalking off to loom menacingly at the door.
> 
> He had long ago accepted it was a specialty of his.
> 
> Hawke spoke to the slaver, his charm and friendliness exaggerated to the max.  No one Hawke actually respected got this treatment - the false but overly sincere sounding platitudes.  In short order he had their captive eating out of the palm of his hands. He told them everything. Half of it was lies of course - and quite a bit more what they had already known.  But there was enough new information that the trouble they had gone through to get him had been worth it.
> 
> “So you’ll, let me go now, right?”
> 
> “ _ I  _ did promise you that, didn’t  _ I.   _ That if you told  _ me  _ what you knew that  _ I  _ would let you go.”  Hawke’s repeated emphasis on the words ‘me’ and ‘I’ as he stroked his beard seemed lost on the man bound to the chair who began his struggles against the binds again.
> 
> He nodded, and Hawke sighed then dropped to his knee to slice through the rope.  “I’m nothing if not a man of my word, after all.”
> 
> The second the rope hit the floor the Ferelden leapt from his chair, full speed towards the door.
> 
> The door Fenris stood conveniently in front of.
> 
> Though he made it look as if he would step out of the way his arm shot out to catch the fleeing man by the wrist, wrenching it around until he had the man pinned against the solid wood, his hand held at a painful angle against his back.  Curses flew as he struggled and attempted to kick his way free again. 
> 
> “You promised!  You gave your word!”
> 
> All Fenris could do was laugh, especially when Hawke never dropped the act of kind benevolence.  “Of course! And I did as I promised.” He leaned in close to the irate man and pointed at himself.  “ _ I  _ let you go.  Fenris though,” Hawke’s gaze flickered up to his lover’s, a brief flash of genuine warmth there.  “As much as I love him, I don’t actually speak for Fenris.”
> 
> “And I promised you nothing.”
> 
>  
> 
>  

“Offer me something.”

Fenris’ voice is even rougher than usual from disuse.

“Oh!  He does speak!  Would you look at that!”

“And you obviously have ears.  What remains to be seen is if you have a brain to go with them.”

Hawke isn’t phased, a small smile playing on his lips.  “And what a lovely voice.”

He has to close his eyes to avoid Hawke seeing the reflexive and overly fond eye roll.  The sound of his teasing is too familiar, and familiarity is dangerous until he knows what is going on.

“Do you want me to answer your questions, or not?”

Hawke actually deflates somewhat and looks as if he is lost in thought.  “As much as I do, I’m afraid I don’t have anything to offer.”

“Offer me my freedom.”  His answer is immediate and demanding. 

Though Hawke appears at first to have an answer, he bites back on it, his face betraying a conflict of thoughts and emotions before he finally sighs.  Though he looks disappointed, Fenris recognizes the glint in his eyes that says he is hiding something. “I could not hope to make that promise yet.”

To his surprise, Fenris finds himself relieved.  He isn’t being treated with any artificial sympathy.  There are, on the surface, no tricks. It is almost enough to make him more confused than before.  Hawke always had a plan, and always was quick to figure out how to get exactly what he wanted. “If you have nothing to offer, how exactly did you expect to get me to talk?”

“I-” Hawke drops his gaze.  “I suppose I just hoped you would just…” He pauses, then shrugs with a half-cocked smile.  “...come around?”

The sight wraps a blanket of warmth around Fenris’ icy heart.  He has to work hard not to fall into old habits and ignores how much that look used to earn the man a kiss.  The pain of that thought is real enough.

“You are terrible at this.”  His words are shaky, and even he can hear the fondness that holds them up.

For a moment Hawke looks offended but, it is quickly replaced by an open and uninhibited laugh.

He can’t deny it is a beautiful sight. 

“As you say.  Though please try to keep your keen observations from my men.”

Hawke stands while Fenris grimaces, the words a bitter reminder that this is not a game but a very real and precarious situation.  

“I’ll think of something.” He promises.

Fenris stares, watching him leave and biting his lip not to shout, to beg for him to stay.  With the loud click that echoes through the barren room, he is left alone, cold and wretched on the stone floor, with nothing but darkness and his never-ending nightmares.

 

****

 

It is either later the same day or quite a bit of time passes.  Fenris doesn’t know. He doesn’t care. Either way, when Hakwe does finally return he has kept his word.  

Fenris finds himself wishing he had never made the suggestion in the first place.

“Wine?”  He asks doing his damnedest to not let the sudden onslaught of emotions slip through.  It is a coincidence, nothing more. It has to be. He doesn’t think he could stand it if it was anything else.

“If you promise not to go for my throat I will release your hands and you can drink to your heart’s content.”  Before Fenris even opens his mouth to answer Hawke is moving to do as he had said. Not to mention that Fenris hadn’t agreed to anything, or said if this was an acceptable trade for information.  It seems as if Hawke just knew it would suffice.

Damn him.  “It is usually not wise to trust so easily.”

Hake’s answer is a grumble as the chains fall to the ground.  “Don’t remind me.”

Despite how easily he had seemed to trust, Hawke is on the other side of the room before he can move his now free hands to his front and rub at the sore red marks around his wrist.  The bottle sits just in front of him, but he doesn’t grab it just yet. instead, he takes advantage of the freedom of movement the situation allows him and stretches. His entire body protests every motion, some of it even to the point of being painful.  Eventually, when he knows moving will give him no further relief, he settles, legs stretched out in front.

When he picks up the bottle he makes an attempt at checking for the maker’s mark but the light is too dim and the shadows too dark to identify.  So he pops the already unsealed cork and gives it a taste.

He nearly spits in disbelief.  

Nevarran.  Silky. A touch of vanilla, without a hint of sweetness.

His longtime favorite.

Apparently, his distress is written plainly on his face.  “You don’t like it.” Hawke crosses his arms and frowns as if this was unexpected.  “I can’t stand it either, to be honest.”

Which is true.  He even complained when Fenris would kiss him after drinking it, even if he didn’t actually ever stop him from doing it - the drinking or the kissing.

“You brought me wine you don’t like?”  He asks, curious - cautious. 

“Well, thing is, I have a stash of it.”  Hawke admits sheepishly. He rubs the back of his neck.  His next words are somewhere between a whisper and a mumble, almost as if he is having trouble admitting them even to himself.  “I keep buying it on impulse and I don’t know why.”

At that, Fenris blinks in stark surprise, tips up the bottle and downs half of it in one go.  Even if Hawke doesn’t remember him he remembers the details. It seems to bother him a great deal, almost as much as Fenris, that he can’t remember WHY those things are important.

When he stops to take a breath - recovered enough to talk without his voice betraying him - he shakes his head.  “You should start asking questions. I will not lie, but when the drink is gone, so are the answers.”

Hawke’s response is immediate.  “What is your name?”

Fenris, however, had been prepared for this.  He knew he could not hear Hawke say his name without their years of knowledge and shared experiences behind it, so he skirted the question while still, technically, not lying.  “You may call me El.” He had briefly considered just having him call him ‘Elf’ but that would have been a bit much, so he’d simply shortened it. 

Hawke frowns.  “Short for?”

“Whatever you want it to be short for” 

His gaze turns harsh.  “That is not your name.”  He states with absolute, and unexpected, certainty.

“It doesn’t matter.”  Fenris takes another long draw from the bottle.  “It is what you will call me.” 

It is obvious Hawke doesn’t like that answer but he doesn’t argue.  Instead, he glares, then shakes his head while never taking his eyes from Fenris.  “Why did you come here?”

“I think you know that answer already.”

Though Hawke huffs in frustration, a hint of a grin plays at the corner of his mouth.  “How did you get in?”

Briefly, he entertains the idea of telling him, maybe even showing him.  He has had worse ideas in the past that he had acted on with less care. While he debates with himself, Fenris lets his lips linger at the mouth of the bottle, catching the way Hawke watches him, the way he tries to mask his movements when he adjusts himself.  After another, deliberately slow swig that leaves the wine almost empty, he leans as far forward as possible and smirks.

“Through the door.”

“That doesn’t help!”  He accuses, which is perfectly reasonable.

“I said I would tell you the truth, and I have.  I never said anything about elaborating.” With that, Fenris finishes off the last dregs of the bottle.

Just in time, too.

“Do I know you?”

Hawke’s words are soft, and Fenris can tell he is forcing himself to ask but doesn’t want to know the answer.  Or worse, he already knows and doesn't want to be proved right, one way or the other.

“Sorry.”  Fenris holds up the now empty bottle and holds it upside down.  “You’re all out of answers.” He says as flat as his broken heart can manage.

Which is BLATANTLY not a no and Hawke seems to understand that.  He nods, then drops his head and the silence settles over them once more.

Not for the first time, Fenris has to stop himself from breaking down and telling him everything.   _I love you. You love me, but you died and then you weren’t dead but that means you broke your promise to come back.  Now I_ don't _know if you’ve gone evil or been_ brainwashed _or I’m just experiencing a fever dream-nightmare I’ll never wake up from._

Despite his best efforts, the sound of his humorless, broken laugh, escapes his lips.

The sound seems to spur Hawke into movement.  Suddenly, he’s very close. Fenris doesn’t flinch, though he doesn’t know if its because he genuinely doesn’t think he’ll harm him or because he’s just given up.  

“It's time to put the bracelets back on.”  He goes behind Fenris, who grasps his own hands at his back without hesitation.

“Would you rather me on my knees for you?”  Fenris asks, voice dark and bitter.

But Hawke’s fingers pause at his wrist, his callused skin just barely touching, a memory of their connection, of their past.

He is silent, then leans in close, voice barely a whisper as he keeps a close eye on the door.

“Whatever you thought you were accomplishing by coming here, you have screwed up months of work towards actually taking down the entire operation.”  Fenris can almost feel his anger and frustration, not just through his touch but the sheer passion in his words. His own shock at the statement leaves him frozen in place. “So congrats on that. Now I get to wing it just to get you out of here before they ship you out and the last year of my life has been wasted.”  As if waiting for a response, Hawke falls silent and doesn’t move.

So he hadn’t gone evil.  He wants to be relieved, to shout for joy that whatever Hawke has lost, it wasn’t his heart.  

Before meeting Hawke, a lifetime ago, Fenris would have scoffed at someone doing what Hawke is.  After meeting Hawke, after loving him, and being loved by him, after fighting and rescuing so many at his side, he knows without a shadow of a doubt the only person that man would ever sacrifice for the greater good is himself.  And he had, once.  But now, without even knowing who Fenris is, or why he feels so important to him, he’s throwing away so much work - the opportunity to save dozens, if not hundreds, of future potential victims for one person.

And that is so HAWKE it hurts.

“You don’t have to waste it.”  He reminds him, voice quiet and gentle. “You don’t have to get me out.  I am but one elf.” Then, almost afraid to say the words out loud, he adds.  “Why do you care?”

“I…” There is a long, heavy pause.  Fenris can feel the heat of his breath.  He holds his own, waiting for the answer.

“I don’t know.”

Hawke’s painful admission comes with cold iron being clamped down around Fenris’ wrists.  But once the lock is in place, his touch lingers.

“Get some rest.  You’ll need it come morning.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come hang out on [Tumblr](http://toriceratops.tumblr.com/) with me.


End file.
